Thunderpipes:Fuggin Bizzy: russsssman: It's almost like Bush wasn't so bad after all.

Let's not get carried away. Bush 43 was the worst president in my lifetime.

History will say differently. The new Normal after Obama is done is going to be a complete disaster. We can never recover fiscally either, we are to far gone. Democrats breed like rabbits, so it will never get better. Obama will be remembered as the President who destroyed the country.

I don't get it. Before Newscorp completely retard-ized WSJ, I would read comments on stories. During the Bush years, most their readers correctly surmised there was no good way out of this, no way out but down.

Nowadays, it's all Obama's fault. And if you point out it's not, then they get all butthurt about how you're an idiot lib who blames everything on Bush.

gobstopping:Hitler gassed 6 million Jews. Are you saying America should have done the same thing?

we didn't have six million jews at the time. but now we do. but the stature of limitations on jew gassing is seven times seven years, as it is written by g-d in the torah. therefore obama is impotent to respond.

hubiestubert:We can't bring many of these folks to trial. Or rather, if we do, they will walk thanks to lack of access to representation and violation of human rights. We can't send them home, where they will become martyrs to a cause. The issue is that they remain in a legal Limbo, because no one put a lot of thought into chain of custody or chain of evidence in their capture. We passed some laws to keep them there, but not enough to put them through our judicial system, and since there is no state of war, they can't even be tried by a military tribunal.

THIS was my problem from the get go. THIS. Had we made this into a law enforcement matter, we could have captured, tried, and convicted a good number of folks. There are Supermax facilities where we have terrorists locked up today, and without any contact with their peeps. They have been removed from the field, and were convicted in a real trial. Now, we have folks who are frightened by the thought of even bringing them to trial, because folks realize that these folks will walk. Free and clear if we even tried.

Folks can call it a failure all they want, but there really is no choice in this matter. We cannot release them--not with the current climate overseas. Not with several actors who will pounce upon them, not in nations that will simply release them and turn them into symbols and who will fete them as heroes for being captured. We can't try them here. Cannot. They go into a court, they will walk, and the result is even worse than simply letting them go home or releasing them to their state of origin.

Is it a travesty? Yup. It was a travesty when they were captured without any thought to any form of chain of evidence or custody in the first place. It was a travesty when we turned their capture into a military matter, without any thought for trial or what to do afterwards. It is a problem that the previous Administration handed this one, and at this point, the GOP is making it impossible to even think about trying to fix ...

If we have a trial and they walk, that is the price of justice, the consequences of them going free cannot be held to be above due process, other wise the constitution is meaningless.

Gyrfalcon:There are three options. We can move them to US prisons and try them. We can let them go and face the consequences. Or we can execute all of them and watch our leaders go to the Hague for war crimes. That's it. There are no other options. But we're going to have to pick one and live with it. Myself, I'd go with putting them on trial, knowing they're going to walk, and exposing the awful, dirty secrets that have been going on at Gitmo for the last 12 years...and watching our leaders go to the Hague for war crimes. But for f*ck's sake, we need to do something.

Sweetness, I would LOVE to see these folks go on trial. And be freed, and the blame go to the folks who screwed the pooch on this, and shed some light on things, but I am also cynical enough to realize that this won't happen in the current environment. Hence, the flavor of my text, in that we cannot do so, now.

The sensible thing, was what I have suggested from the get go: treat terrorists as criminals. Build cases, try cases, imprison or execute, and be done with it. Have the full weight and measure of the law on our side, and be done with it. The best thing to do with the inveterate terrorists, is to lock them away, and forget about them. Nothing special. Nothing frightening, just some guys in jail cells without much hope for release, and be done with it. THAT is how you deal with terrorists. Not by killing them. Not by making them into martyrs, not by making them anything special in the least-- because that is what they want. To be special. To be so dangerous that they can't be released. Instead, you make them into examples, by trying them, jailing them, and moving on.

Unfortunately, as a nation, we sort of lost that step. Instead, we turned into pants besh*tting cowards when it came to actually making real cases against these folks, and for trying them, and for doing much else than holding them. That isn't MY choice, but what the nation has done, with Senators and Reps and Governors, and State Senators and Reps befouling themselves in fear, and THAT is shameful.

I don't think that we don't have choices. I don't think that we have the courage, as a nation now, to exercise those choices, and we lost those a while ago, to look tough for the camera.

Hydra:166 prisoners? Small potatoes - how many non-violent drug offenders were locked up nationwide today?

How many of those non-violent drug offenders have been incarcerated without a trial, conviction or indeed being charged with drug related offences under US law? None.

That's 166 human rights violations right there and potentially war crimes as well; remember they weren't uniformed combatants and none of the paperwork to support this declared war on the country and people of 'terror' has ever been filed. Most are technically civilians being held without trial, due process hell I'd wager good money than none of them have been officially charged with an actual crime under US law.

So that's 166 violations of pretty much everything you as an American hold dear and are supposed to enshrine. If that doesn't make you go 'Ohh shiat" then I don't think anything will however put the bong down and try to understand that those 166 people and their non-convicted indefinite incarceration are a REALLY BIG PROBLEM.

Vaneshi:How many of those non-violent drug offenders have been incarcerated without a trial, conviction or indeed being charged with drug related offences under US law? None.

/do you have ANY idea how many MILLIONS of people have been incarcerated under the fundamentally unjust Controlled Substances Act (let alone the HUNDREDS OF THOUSANDS who have been falsely imprisoned by planted evidence, witness tampering, and other forms of police corruption) not to mention those killed in SWAT raids on the wrong houses in the four decades since the war on drugs began?//hundreds of thousands of lives have been lost literally and millions more lives have been ruined due to this "war" while more than 166 people died yesterday from car accidents - get your priorities straight and focus your energy where it's need most

At least the members of his torture regime are afraid to leave the country.

I would find it funny if Rumsfeld went on a trip to Europe and got snagged and taken to The Hague to face war crime charges. It would never happen to Bush or Cheney (too protected), but Rummy and some others? Possible. Not likely, but with the right political climate in Europe, you never know.

Technically they aren't terrorists. Technically they are just some guys rounded up and thrown in a prison camp without any charges made against them, although the State assures us they are all "Very Bad People".

What if these were not mostly Muslims from the Middle East, but instead were your neighbors? Your family? What if you were one of these allegedly "Very Bad People"?

Just because the Government says someone is bad and needs to be held indefinitely does not make it so. That's why we have a legal system, including a system of military justice for prisoners caught in a war zone. Gitmo is an atrocity, and needs to close now. Put those guys in a Supermax prison and give them their day in court, be it civilian or military.

JustFarkinAround:Look at the list of Gitmo detainees... It's like the Al-Jazeera subscriber list

So basically, they're terrorists because Fox News told you so. Looking at the detainee list on wikipedia right now. Blank, repatriated, blank, alleged, blank, released ... Oh, and "arrested at the age of 13"

Some scary folks you've got there. You True US Patriots™ must be shiatting yourselves over these guys.

Gyrfalcon:Are you honestly saying anyone "likes" the idea of war at all?

People who vote GOP / watch Fox News probably do. The war doesn't happen in their house or their country, and it doesn't happen to their families. It happens to brown muslin people on the other side of the planet because jeebus on a raptor hates turrists.

The US has been at war more or less continuously since WWII, and mostly by choice. Yeah, there are people who like the idea of war.

Uncle Tractor:The US has been at war more or less continuously since WWII, and mostly by choice. Yeah, there are people who like the idea of war.

Did you have a point here? Judging by your rhetoric on the average American citizen, whether they vote Democrat or Republican, I doubt it. You just came into the thread after it died to mouth off whargarbl.

It's ironic that you'd single out the US as responsible, when it's actually been the entire First World playing a game of global chess with resources and money as the wager. Anyone who thinks the Cold War was just political rhetoric and posturing is historically ignorant. Europe, the US, China and Russia have been fighting each other in ostensibly deniable Proxy Wars for the last 68 years. Everyone points out how the US supported "regime changes" and terrible people because they supported NATO/US instead of the Eastern Bloc, but no one wants to talk about how the Soviets did the same thing.

It's pointless moral absolution using hindsight, for the most part, to blame the US for that exclusively.

BronyMedic:Uncle Tractor: The US has been at war more or less continuously since WWII, and mostly by choice. Yeah, there are people who like the idea of war.

Did you have a point here? Judging by your rhetoric on the average American citizen, whether they vote Democrat or Republican, I doubt it. You just came into the thread after it died to mouth off whargarbl.

It's ironic that you'd single out the US as responsible, when it's actually been the entire First World playing a game of global chess with resources and money as the wager. Anyone who thinks the Cold War was just political rhetoric and posturing is historically ignorant. Europe, the US, China and Russia have been fighting each other in ostensibly deniable Proxy Wars for the last 68 years. Everyone points out how the US supported "regime changes" and terrible people because they supported NATO/US instead of the Eastern Bloc, but no one wants to talk about how the Soviets did the same thing.

It's pointless moral absolution using hindsight, for the most part, to blame the US for that exclusively.

Do you intentionally miss the point, or do you just want to be oppositional?

Also the "cold war" was mostly rhetoric and posturing to support arms buildups for fun and profit. And anyone who believes otherwise is a simpleton readily eating their spoon fed information from domestic authority. The USSR was not a realistic threat to the world as posterity as proved.

Frederick:Do you intentionally miss the point, or do you just want to be oppositional?

What point? Durr Americans Bloodthirsty?

Frederick:Also the "cold war" was mostly rhetoric and posturing to support arms buildups for fun and profit. And anyone who believes otherwise is a simpleton readily eating their spoon fed information from domestic authority. The USSR was not a realistic threat to the world as posterity as proved.

Technically they aren't terrorists. Technically they are just some guys rounded up and thrown in a prison camp without any charges made against them, although the State assures us they are all "Very Bad People".

What if these were not mostly Muslims from the Middle East, but instead were your neighbors? Your family? What if you were one of these allegedly "Very Bad People"?

Just because the Government says someone is bad and needs to be held indefinitely does not make it so. That's why we have a legal system, including a system of military justice for prisoners caught in a war zone. Gitmo is an atrocity, and needs to close now. Put those guys in a Supermax prison and give them their day in court, be it civilian or military.

THIS.

I am dismayed by the number of people in this thread who seem to be trying to justify the treatment of these prisoners.

Rockstone:Frederick: The USSR was not a realistic threat to the world as posterity as proved.

Oh really?A nation with enough nukes to wipe out the world is not a threat to that same world???

Is that what you were told? What happened to those weapons; they still a threat or not? Is Russia the same threat the USSR was -why not?

The truth is the USSR's nuclear weapon program was greatly exaggerated. Their weapons were in such disrepair that were essentially a greater threat to the Soviets than they were to anyone else. Do some research on it, the facts are readily available. You are still adhering to cold war propaganda.

BronyMedic:Frederick: Do you intentionally miss the point, or do you just want to be oppositional?

What point? Durr Americans Bloodthirsty?

Frederick: Also the "cold war" was mostly rhetoric and posturing to support arms buildups for fun and profit. And anyone who believes otherwise is a simpleton readily eating their spoon fed information from domestic authority. The USSR was not a realistic threat to the world as posterity as proved.

[www.troll.me image 552x414]

The Cold War was one gigantic proxy war between the United States and Russia. It was not "rhetoric and posturing". Millions died over 50 years because the US and Soviets used second world nations and third world hellholes to fight their wars for them. The policy of creating Banana Republics in South and Middle America, Asia, the Middle East, and Sub-Saharan Africa have come back to bite us in the ass still today with world politics.

Your ignorant Wiki link did not support your moronic argument in any way. It is a stretch to suggest the cold war is a reference to proxy wars. The cold war is more specifically a reference to the nuclear stand-off between USA and USSR.

Frederick:Is that what you were told? What happened to those weapons; they still a threat or not? Is Russia the same threat the USSR was -why not?

Yes, they are still a threat. Then again, so are we. They're less of a threat today because they're less likely to want to attack us, but they ARE still a threat.

Frederick:The truth is the USSR's nuclear weapon program was greatly exaggerated. Their weapons were in such disrepair that were essentially a greater threat to the Soviets than they were to anyone else. Do some research on it, the facts are readily available. You are still adhering to cold war propaganda.

Since when? Even if they were in disrepair, you only need a few nukes to cause catastrophe. Even if 99% of 6000 nukes are bad, 60 nukes are still pretty dangerous.

Rockstone:Frederick: Is that what you were told? What happened to those weapons; they still a threat or not? Is Russia the same threat the USSR was -why not?

Yes, they are still a threat. Then again, so are we. They're less of a threat today because they're less likely to want to attack us, but they ARE still a threat.

Frederick: The truth is the USSR's nuclear weapon program was greatly exaggerated. Their weapons were in such disrepair that were essentially a greater threat to the Soviets than they were to anyone else. Do some research on it, the facts are readily available. You are still adhering to cold war propaganda.

Since when? Even if they were in disrepair, you only need a few nukes to cause catastrophe. Even if 99% of 6000 nukes are bad, 60 nukes are still pretty dangerous.

So by this logic then the UK, France, Germany, Israel, India, Pakistan, N. Korea, etc are all threats. Why single out Russia (the former USSR)?

The point was the US's penchant for war. Then BronyMedic brought up the USSR and the cold war. Which was a strawman argument. Compared to the US, the USSR was not a global threat, despite whatever nuclear weapons they posses.

Frederick:Rockstone: Frederick: The USSR was not a realistic threat to the world as posterity as proved.

Oh really?A nation with enough nukes to wipe out the world is not a threat to that same world???

Is that what you were told? What happened to those weapons; they still a threat or not? Is Russia the same threat the USSR was -why not?

The truth is the USSR's nuclear weapon program was greatly exaggerated. Their weapons were in such disrepair that were essentially a greater threat to the Soviets than they were to anyone else. Do some research on it, the facts are readily available. You are still adhering to cold war propaganda.

BronyMedic: Frederick: Do you intentionally miss the point, or do you just want to be oppositional?

What point? Durr Americans Bloodthirsty?

Frederick: Also the "cold war" was mostly rhetoric and posturing to support arms buildups for fun and profit. And anyone who believes otherwise is a simpleton readily eating their spoon fed information from domestic authority. The USSR was not a realistic threat to the world as posterity as proved.

[www.troll.me image 552x414]

The Cold War was one gigantic proxy war between the United States and Russia. It was not "rhetoric and posturing". Millions died over 50 years because the US and Soviets used second world nations and third world hellholes to fight their wars for them. The policy of creating Banana Republics in South and Middle America, Asia, the Middle East, and Sub-Saharan Africa have come back to bite us in the ass still today with world politics.

Your ignorant Wiki link did not support your moronic argument in any way. It is a stretch to suggest the cold war is a reference to proxy wars. The cold war is more specifically a reference to the nuclear stand-off between USA and USSR.

You are dumb and you should feel dumb.

Well, if you don't have anything else, then ad hominem and insulting cited sources will surely prove your narrow and revisionist view of world history, and wipe clean the slate of bad behavior by the Soviets and US during the Cold War.

BigNumber12:Frederick: It is a stretch to suggest the cold war is a reference to proxy wars

Seriously. If that had been a major part of the Cold War, they'd probably mention it in the second paragraph or something.

Oh right. You're smarter than Wikipedia.

You mean that paragraph where this is the first line:

The Cold War was so named because the two major powers-each possessing nuclear weapons and thereby threatened with mutual assured destruction-did not meet in direct military combat.

Also that is not the link BronyMedic provided.

Further from Wikipedia:

The Cold War was a protracted geopolitical, ideological, and economic struggle that emerged after World War II between the global superpowers of the Soviet Union and the West (United Kingdom, United States and NATO).

Notice in that definition the lack of the word "proxy". Lumping in so called proxy wars with "the cold war" is revisionist. At the time those "proxy" wars were not considered an extension of the cold war. Vietnam and Korea were never considered at that time to be a part of the "cold war". They were informally considered proxies -but with China and the US; not the USSR and the US. (Notice a common denominator there furthering Uncle Tractor's point?)

BronyMedic:I'll ask for an apology, but given your whargarbl over the past few posts, I doubt you'll admit you don't know what you're talking about.

You keep changing the argument so much the you cant keep track of what you are talking about:original point:Uncle Tractor: The US has been at war more or less continuously since WWII, and mostly by choice. Yeah, there are people who like the idea of war.

to which you replied:

BronyMedic:It's ironic that you'd single out the US as responsible, when it's actually been the entire First World playing a game of global chess with resources and money as the wager. Anyone who thinks the Cold War was just political rhetoric and posturing is historically ignorant.

Which was a straw man argument, an exaggeration and misinformed. Provide a dated reference to "cold war" with any of those proxies listed. It is revisionist.

Hydra://hundreds of thousands of lives have been lost literally and millions more lives have been ruined due to this "war" while more than 166 people died yesterday from car accidents - get your priorities straight and focus your energy where it's need most

You are in violation of the human rights acts, the Hague conventions and are in violation of your own constitution, it's amendments and well that's your whole justice system.

And you've just admitted you are a morally bankrupt country.

Would you like to try again or shall we move directly to the war crimes trials and you get to watch your political leaders shot? Do you understand that or are you too farking retarded to comprehend the magnitude of difference that those 166 people represent compared to road deaths or arrested stoners?

BronyMedic:Frederick: You keep changing the argument so much the you cant keep track of what you are talking about:original point:

[people.virginia.edu image 500x75]

Really? Define Red Herring, since we're doing lectures on Strawmen and other logical fallacies. This was your statement that I was addressing:

Frederick: Provide a dated reference to "cold war" with any of those proxies listed. It is revisionist.

Does the Gerrold R. Ford Presidential Library fit in your moving goalpost?What about the John F. Kennedy Presidential Library?The Wikipedia link to "Cold War" has many hardcopy cites.

That apology. Any chance? Or are you going to keep defending the indefensible and non-factual?

You have to keep rearranging context in order to appear even remotely competent. The things you say and the links you post do not corroborate each other. Also, for the record, you were the first to go "ad hominem" with your stupid .jpg post.

And I'll dumb this down for you so you can understand: find a reference to "cold war" during the time of the war. Such as an archived news paper article or magazine article form the period using the term "cold war" to describe the war. Each link you provided was after the fact -aka revisionist.

If you would even read the links you are providing you would understand that the term "cold war" was not originally used to describe "proxies".Origins of the termAt the end of World War II, English author and journalist George Orwell used cold war, as a general term, in his essay "You and the Atomic Bomb", published October 19, 1945, in the British newspaper Tribune. Contemplating a world living in the shadow of the threat of nuclear warfare.

Including proxies in the cold war definition is revisionist -not contemporary, hence my example of Korea and Vietnam; both listed in your link of proxy wars, were not considered "cold war" at the time. Those conflicts were sold to the US public on the grounds of "spreading Democracy" -not proxy fighting the Soviets.

Ask your grandparents, who were probably school children in the 1950's, what the cold war meant. They werent hiding under their desks because of proxie wars.

I am weary of engaging with you. I will write this off as a matter of semantics. You adhere to a modern (revisionist) definition of "cold war" and I adhere to a traditional definition.

Frederick:You mean like how you keep pruning comments you reply to? Maybe I should copypasta the whole Wiki article....?

I'm isolating the parts in which you're talking to me, rather than Brony. Ooooh, sinister.

Frederick:Also did you even notice this:http://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Cold_Warhttp://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Cold_War_%28disambiguation%29

A link to the article I've been referring you to, and the disambiguation page for the term? I've noticed both, but what is it that you're wanting me to notice about them? That it's also an American hardcore punk band?

BigNumber12:Frederick: You mean like how you keep pruning comments you reply to? Maybe I should copypasta the whole Wiki article....?

I'm isolating the parts in which you're talking to me, rather than Brony. Ooooh, sinister.

Yeah, uh, that was my point. Isolating the relevant parts. It's ok for you but not for me?

BigNumber12:Frederick: Also did you even notice this:http://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Cold_Warhttp://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Cold_War_%28disambiguation%29

A link to the article I've been referring you to, and the disambiguation page for the term? I've noticed both, but what is it that you're wanting me to notice about them? That it's also an American hardcore punk band?

Historians have also disagreed on what exactly the Cold War was, what the sources of the conflict were, and how to disentangle patterns of action and reaction between the two sides.

While the explanations of the origins of the conflict in academic discussions are complex and diverse, several general schools of thought on the subject can be identified. Historians commonly speak of three differing approaches to the study of the Cold War: "orthodox" accounts, "revisionism," and "post-revisionism." Nevertheless, much of the historiography on the Cold War weaves together two or even all three of these broad categories.

Frederick:That there is disagreement on what "Cold War" means. Further reading:http://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Historiography_of_the_Cold_War

Historians have also disagreed on what exactly the Cold War was, what the sources of the conflict were, and how to disentangle patterns of action and reaction between the two sides.

While the explanations of the origins of the conflict in academic discussions are complex and diverse, several general schools of thought on the subject can be identified. Historians commonly speak of three differing approaches to the study of the Cold War: "orthodox" accounts, "revisionism," and "post-revisionism." Nevertheless, much of the historiography on the Cold War weaves together two or even all three of these broad categories.

I don't see anything in that article that disputes the idea that those proxy wars were key aspects of the Cold War.

Frederick:Yeah, uh, that was my point. Isolating the relevant parts. It's ok for you but not for me?

Cutting out the parts of the article that prove my point: exactly the same as my cutting out your questions for another Farker.

BigNumber12:Cutting out the parts of the article that prove my point: exactly the same as my cutting out your questions for another Farker.

I'm writing him off as a troll. The point at which he decided to ignore the obvious meaning of historical revisionism and the intent of the way I worded it, and play a game of semantics to try to be right by finding some sort of hidden meaning is the point at which I bow out.

BronyMedic:BigNumber12: Cutting out the parts of the article that prove my point: exactly the same as my cutting out your questions for another Farker.

I'm writing him off as a troll. The point at which he decided to ignore the obvious meaning of historical revisionism and the intent of the way I worded it, and play a game of semantics to try to be right by finding some sort of hidden meaning is the point at which I bow out.

durbnpoisn:I don't understand how and why we have a military prison in Cuba to start with. We've had a trade embargo for decades. I've never actually gotten an explanation for how that makes any sense.

Did you ever actually try to find the information? It's a pretty straight forward explanation following the simplest of investigation.

Pangea:durbnpoisn: I don't understand how and why we have a military prison in Cuba to start with. We've had a trade embargo for decades. I've never actually gotten an explanation for how that makes any sense.

Did you ever actually try to find the information? It's a pretty straight forward explanation following the simplest of investigation.

http://lmgtfy.com/?q=how+does+the+us+have+guantanamo+bay+cuba

The United States seized Guantanamo Bay and established a naval base there in 1898 during the Spanish-American War. Five years later, the U.S. and Cuba signed a lease giving Guantanamo Bay to the U.S.

In 1934, Cuba and the U.S. signed a treaty that gave the U.S. a perpetual lease to the area.